[slime-devel] Slime distributed with GNU Emacs
Some people were contacted by one of the current GNU Emacs maintainers and requested to assign copyright to the FSF in order to allow Slime be distributed with GNU Emacs. I'm still having mail server issues (seems like I'm only able to send mail on full moon), and hence could not participate in a short internal roundabout mail between Luke and Helmut. Helmut rightly said that the matter should be discussed on the mailing list anyway. So below follows undelivered mail, and represent my thoughts right after having read about the request. Seems futile to me. Too many contributors over the time. Will the SWANK side not be included? (Then how is that supposed to be distributed?) SWANK is actually PD, not GPL. There's this saying that Germans (and maybe Austrians, too?) cannot legally give up their copyright and hence cannot actually release stuff in public domain. So the situation of the SWANK side is pretty muddy to begin with. Supposing all these legal matters get sorted out, and someone of the FSF actually does all the legal work and gets the necessary assignments (an Heracles job in my eyes), and Slime becomes part of Emacs, then there's still the issue how future contributions are supposed to be dealt with and whether need for assignment may be regarded as an obstacle for contribution. OTOH, I don't see major contribution happening. And then yet another issue is synchronization between a Slime development tree, and the putative Slime Emacs tree; no one has so far stepped up who actually wants to take care of regular releases of Slime which then may become a prerequisite of some sort. In short: too much hassle for too little gain. On the other hand, it's not really my hassle, so I don't really object to the idea. I think there's a new packaging system being developed for Emacs for third-party contributions. It strikes me that may a better fit for Slime. -T.
On Wed, 07 Jul 2010 11:44:59 +0800 Tobias C Rittweiler <tcr@freebits.de> wrote:
I think there's a new packaging system being developed for Emacs for third-party contributions. It strikes me that may a better fit for Slime.
Although I have no authority on SLIME whatsoever, I think that it never was much trouble to install and get SLIME working even if it wasn't shipped with Emacs. If their future package format makes that even easier, that's for the best... As for the license, other than all the required work to transfer copyright, isn't PD generally a better license for SWANK? While transfering copyright to the FSF would add many restrictions. If PD turns out to be a problem for a few countries, then wouldn't an MIT-style license fix this while restricting as few as possible the code? Alternatively, if SLIME were GPL and included in Emacs in the future, and the network protocol between SLIME and SWANK are well defined, it probably would not be too much of a problem to keep SWANK under a less restrictive license and to distribute it separately? A potential problem I can see with SWANK under an FSF license would be that it's the part that needs to be embedded with languages and/or projects the most. As for SLIME, if it's used exclusively with Emacs it's probably not an issue at all... Thanks, -- Matt
* Matthew Mondor [2010-07-07 17:04] writes:
On Wed, 07 Jul 2010 11:44:59 +0800 Tobias C Rittweiler <tcr@freebits.de> wrote:
I think there's a new packaging system being developed for Emacs for third-party contributions. It strikes me that may a better fit for Slime.
I think ELPA (or whatever the name of the packaging system will be) still requires copyright assignments to the FSF. Almost certainly if it's distributed by the FSF.
Although I have no authority on SLIME whatsoever, I think that it never was much trouble to install and get SLIME working even if it wasn't shipped with Emacs. If their future package format makes that even easier, that's for the best...
As for the license, other than all the required work to transfer copyright, isn't PD generally a better license for SWANK?
Public Domain isn't a license. It means that the material is not copyrighted and no license is needed.
While transfering copyright to the FSF would add many restrictions. If PD turns out to be a problem for a few countries, then wouldn't an MIT-style license fix this while restricting as few as possible the code?
It's probably not so easy to "change" the license of stuff that is already in PD. Since PD more or less means that there's no copyright holder there's nobody who could give a license. Also if the copyright (for the non PD parts) is assigned to the FSF they would presumably change the license to GPL.
Alternatively, if SLIME were GPL and included in Emacs in the future, and the network protocol between SLIME and SWANK are well defined, it probably would not be too much of a problem to keep SWANK under a less restrictive license and to distribute it separately?
Well, yes. But it's almost the opposite of what we were doing until now. We essentially made 'cvs up' easy instead of making it easy to stay with old/mismatched versions. And as matter of fact, the 'cvs up' approach worked damn well.
A potential problem I can see with SWANK under an FSF license would be that it's the part that needs to be embedded with languages and/or projects the most. As for SLIME, if it's used exclusively with Emacs it's probably not an issue at all...
Good point. Helmut
Re Helmut Eller at "Wed, 07 Jul 2010 20:15:40 +0200" wrote: HE> * Matthew Mondor [2010-07-07 17:04] writes:
On Wed, 07 Jul 2010 11:44:59 +0800 Tobias C Rittweiler <tcr@freebits.de> wrote:
I think there's a new packaging system being developed for Emacs for third-party contributions. It strikes me that may a better fit for Slime.
HE> I think ELPA (or whatever the name of the packaging system will be) HE> still requires copyright assignments to the FSF. Almost certainly if HE> it's distributed by the FSF. Not necessary, as I remember. There is a version of package.el, that supports multiple repositories. And ELPA now is used to provide clojure-mode + custom slime installation for clojure -- With best wishes, Alex Ott, MBA http://alexott.blogspot.com/ http://alexott.net http://alexott-ru.blogspot.com/
* Alex Ott [2010-07-08 07:01] writes:
Re
Helmut Eller at "Wed, 07 Jul 2010 20:15:40 +0200" wrote: HE> * Matthew Mondor [2010-07-07 17:04] writes:
On Wed, 07 Jul 2010 11:44:59 +0800 Tobias C Rittweiler <tcr@freebits.de> wrote:
I think there's a new packaging system being developed for Emacs for third-party contributions. It strikes me that may a better fit for Slime.
HE> I think ELPA (or whatever the name of the packaging system will be) HE> still requires copyright assignments to the FSF. Almost certainly if HE> it's distributed by the FSF.
Not necessary, as I remember. There is a version of package.el, that supports multiple repositories.
And ELPA now is used to provide clojure-mode + custom slime installation for clojure
Well, see: http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel/119065 and http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel/118957 Helmut
Re Helmut Eller at "Thu, 08 Jul 2010 10:16:56 +0200" wrote: HE> * Alex Ott [2010-07-08 07:01] writes:
Not necessary, as I remember. There is a version of package.el, that supports multiple repositories.
And ELPA now is used to provide clojure-mode + custom slime installation for clojure
HE> Well, see: HE> http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel/119065 HE> and HE> http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel/118957 Yes, I saw them - but I hope, that this will be applicable only for "official" emacs packages. I don't want, that packages will stopped from distribution only by political reasons -- With best wishes, Alex Ott, MBA http://alexott.blogspot.com/ http://alexott.net http://alexott-ru.blogspot.com/
* Alex Ott [2010-07-08 08:22] writes:
Yes, I saw them - but I hope, that this will be applicable only for "official" emacs packages. I don't want, that packages will stopped from distribution only by political reasons
The FSF is all about politics and will not distribute packages that don't conform to their rules. If we don't like those rules we can't distribute SLIME via the FSF. If somebody else distributes those packages they will also have certain rules, like Debian has rules for .deb packages. Helmut
FWIW I vote NO I keep slime files along with my lisp source and the .emacs file. They are very much separate from the emacs installation. I have used emacs in linux env mostly but recently I have been using it in cygwin env I update cygwin for various reasons and I see emacs getting updated. I can control that if desired, but I see no need to. I don't update slime that often and I am pretty sure that would be more disruptive. Also one is a VERY mature product other is not (that's just reality , not to be taken negatively) I see very little gain and lots of issues -Antony
participants (5)
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Alex Ott -
Antony Sequeira -
Helmut Eller -
Matthew Mondor -
Tobias C Rittweiler